The assurance that is often given as an apology for slavery, that
the slaves are contented and happy--that they are not abused, and
are well provided for, is as basely false and untrue, as the system
is infamous, horrid and cruel. For an individual to plead such an
excuse for Southern Slavery, in view of occupying the place of a slave
himself, even in its mildest form, I apprehend that such a man who
knows any thing of slavery--of its abuses--its cruelties--its lashes
and murders, his tongue would become palsied on his lips, and a shudder
as stiffening as the chill of death would come over him at the prospect
of a life of so much _pleasure_ and _happiness_, as he boldly asserts
is the enjoyment of the slave. Put him there, and let him feel for
one short month what he knows the slave feels, and then let him come
out with an apology for such bondage, and tell of its blessings, its
beauties and happiness. And I ask him in all sincerity, if he does not
think the slave feels, when he is brought out to be sold, somewhat as
he would, if he was forced to stand upon the same block, and hear the
Auctioneer tell of his good qualities, his strength, his ingenuity,
his powers of endurance, his unblemished character, and “fully
guarantied against all the vices and maladies prescribed by law.” Let
the experiment be tried with some of these apologists, and take them
into the Arcade in the city of New Orleans and sell them at auction,
and then let them be taken on to a Sugar or Cotton plantation in the
same fields to work with the other _happy_ slaves, and go to his bed
in the same long range of “_beautiful white cottages_,” that look so
neat and _inviting_ as you pass down the Mississippi River. After he
has been here a few years, nay, only through one season of growing cane
or cotton, living upon their _good fare_, their daily _rations_ and
doing their _daily task_, then let him come up, and tell how happy he
has been, and what a curse _liberty_ is, and how much better slavery
is than freedom. And yet, the reply to all this is, “oh, the negroes
don’t know enough to realize anything better, and they cannot take care
of themselves.” Ah, and why are they thus brutalized, and how does
it happen that they know so little? Any one who knows any thing of
Southern slavery, can explain these things, for they know that every
part and parcel of the system, in every particular, is framed with
direct design to brutalize, degrade, and deprave the slave. And they
know too, that when a slave aspires to be a man, that it is a _crime_,
and the charge is brought up against him, “_he is getting too damned
smart_,” and for which is meted out upon his naked back the severest
punishment that can be given by the lash, for the express purpose of
breaking him down, and make him cower before his master like a dog.
They have seen men with a whiter skin than themselves, and mulattoes
too, but a shade darker, who were sons and grandsons of the first men
in Kentucky and Virginia, and men who would consecrate talent and
powers of intellect, and serve even in Southern bondage, as long as
the Patriarch of old did, for a wife, if they could possess one. And do
you not think such men can feel, and will they hug their chains, and
tell you, when they are not under the fear of the lash, that they are
contented and happy? And these apologists know too, that with American
Slavery, as a condition of human bondage, there has never been, in any
age, nor with any people, whether barbarous or civilized, any thing to
compare in point of brutality, cruelty and extreme suffering, resulting
from a combination of causes, that destroy life and shorten the days
of its victims to an extent that legalizes murder; for it is a fact,
proven by the acknowledgment of slave owners themselves, that of an
hundred young men, taken from Kentucky and Virginia, put on Plantations
in Louisiana and Mississippi, seven years will be the average of their
lives. And this is produced by a change of climate, unwholesome food,
over-working, miserable and filthy lodgings, and a general want of
cleanliness in clothing and every thing they have.